Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2009. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
South African Press Association - July 20, 2009
"Patients needing new drug regimens will return to Aids death row," it warned in a statement released at the 2009 International Aids Society conference in Cape Town.
MSF called on drug companies to submit their Aids drug patents to a "patent pool", set up by international drug financing agency Unitaid, and so allow poor countries to access critically needed drugs at affordable prices.
It said figures from a long-running public-sector Aids treatment programme in Khayelitsha showed 16% of patients receiving antiretroviral treatment experienced failure on their first-line drug regimen within five years.
"A quarter of those patients who were switched to a second-line regimen failed on this alternative treatment line within two years. As no third-line regimen is available in South Africa, like in many other developing countries, these patients are now at risk of dying."
Unlike older first-line drugs, most second- and third-line drugs were patented and priced out of reach for patients in developing countries.
"In some of these countries, switching from a first- to second-line regimen increases treatment costs as much as seventeen-fold.
"To stop spiralling costs, countries will have to routinely use measures such as compulsory licences, which allow the generic manufacture of drugs under patent to ensure affordable treatments."
MSF said the patent pool would provide generic producers or researchers with drug licences in exchange for a fee paid to the originator company.
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